RELEASE YOUR MENTAL WORKLOAD!

Marie-Laure Monneret

(Éditions First, 160 pages, 2018)

Women have a strong sense of responsibility when it comes to their home and family. And it is said that men still rely on their wives for the planning of these tasks… Women should let go! Men have never been so invested in the cleaning of their homes and the education of their children. Yet, a lot of women feel like it is their own responsibility. Doing things together seems fine, but thinking of what needs to be done together seems more difficult! You’ll find a 7-stage plan to let go completely and start a realistic and healthy division of tasks in your couple.

Oftentimes domestic balance is left up to the woman to maintain. It is her responsibility to care for the children and complete the housework while her husband works to provide for the family. While many mothers work outside of the home now, many women still feel the overwhelming pressures of balancing their professional work life with maintaining familial peace.

In her introspective new book, Release Your Mental Workload!, Marie-Laure Monneret defines la charge mentale (the mental workload) as the mental exhaustion women feel by working twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week in the workplace and at home. This exhaustion originates from an unequal distribution of responsibility between men and women, a reinforcement of patriarchal family structure and male/female stereotypes, the need to fulfill the role of the modern renaissance woman, and a lack of trust in one’s partner. Collectively these external and internal conflicts cause stress, tensions within the couple, difficulty concentrating, and a loss of self-confidence, which also reinforce the “glass ceiling.” Monneret aims to remedy these symptoms, but believes that fixing the problem should not rest on women alone. The mental workload affects men and women both, so it is up to both parties to work toward a solution.

Release Your Mental Workload! asks us to evaluate ourselves and our relationships to create a more equal family dynamic. In seven key, concrete points, Monneret helps us communicate better, redistribute domestic responsibilities, and reduce the stress of balancing the personal and professional aspects of our lives.

Marie-Laure Monneret is a certified professional coach and the founder of Bloom Coaching. Wanting to align her professional life with her personal values, she became an individual professional coach to help others, after fifteen years of working in marketing and project management. Release Your Mental Workload! is her second book.